4 June 2012 – With the entire film industry changing to digital, film archives need to be well prepared if they want to collect, preserve and show both analogue and digital formats. Based on the recommendations of the “ACE Position Paper on the Digital”, ACE is organising a series of 3 – 4 workshops for (higher) management staff of the ACE member archives to discuss strategies how these challenges can be met. The workshops are conceived as forums to discuss the intellectual and practical requirements which come along with digital archiving. The aim is to pool together competences and expertise already existing in the ACE member archives in such fields as archive technology and strategic planning (digitisation planning, training, funding, etc.).

The first workshop, which starts with a general outlook and focuses on the results of the Study “Challenges of the Digital Era for Film Heritage Institutions”, will be held during the Il Cinema Ritrovato Festival in Bologna on Thursday, 28 June 2012. Registration is open to management staff from the ACE member archives. For further information and to register, please see the draft programme.

The second workshop, dedicated to training in digital workflows and digital preservation, will take place at the Danish Film Institute later this year or early 2013. Further workshops will be scheduled and announced in due time.

4 May 2012 – The 5th edition of the Film Restoration Summer School / FIAF Summer School will take place in Bologna from June to July 2012. The project is organised and hosted by Cineteca di Bologna in collaboration with ACE and FIAF. The main objective of the Summer School is to teach and update participants on how to restore and preserve a film through the use of photochemical and new digital technologies. It is designed for both for archivists and staff working at FIAF archives, and students. For the Festival Edition 2012, ACE awarded a scholarship to five applicants.

Programme and timetable 2012On-line Distance Learning: 9 May- 20 June (on Wednesdays) Theory Classes: Bologna, Il Cinema Ritrovato Film Festival, 23 – 30 June Restoration Practice: Bologna, 2 – 13 July During the internship, participants are supervised by international experts and laboratory staff to put into practice what they learned during their first week of theory.

Please find more information, the full programme and the list of the 36 selected participants here.

Organized by the Filmoteca Española, the conference took place on 7 – 8 June 2010 on the occasion of the Spanish EU Presidency. The following conclusions are based on the presentations by the speakers who constitute a highly representative body drawn from film archives, universities which offer courses related to the film heritage, and institutions dedicated to training in the areas of the conservation and diffusion of cultural heritage within Europe as a whole.

Conclusions

The Conference participants, all representatives from film archives, European universities and training institutes

State:

The creation, in various European countries, of University M.A courses and other introductory training modules designed to provide training related to the Film Heritage, particularly in conservation and restoration.

The holding of specialised conferences, seminars and other modules of ongoing education, largely organised through the initiative of film archives.

That the impact of new technologies calls for the redefining, with an eye to the future, of the occupations and profiles related to the Film Heritage and its conservation and diffusion.

Recommend:

Closer ties between film archives and training centres in order to agree on supply and match it to demand, with a view to a future market of diversified work, and the need to establish broader professional and occupational categories.

Therefore, the formulation of, on the one hand, a referential table of professional tasks and profiles and, on the other, a White Paper on existing training with recognised results.

Request:

That the conservation and valorization of the Film Heritage receive European Union and Member State recognition and support equal to that given to other cultural areas, such as Fine Arts and Libraries.

The establishment at a trans-national European level of an initial training born of an agreement between Universities and Archives, with additional periodic ongoing education initiatives, which would take into account, on the one hand, the array of professional tasks and levels required, and on the other, their place within a broad and high-level training format which responds to the express ambition to put the film heritage on a level footing with other cultural sectors.

An increase in European Union support through the diversity of its programmes and other Community instruments, taking into consideration its trans-national sphere of activity and its principles of subsidiarity.